In June last year, I took a ride on a century-old meter-gauge railway in Kenya that I thought was the worst travel experience ever. The train was running eight hours behind schedule. Waking from a sleep of four hours, I found it had moved only about 16 kilometers.

Hou Liqiang

I was rushing to Xianning, Hubei province, to report news about flooding. Almost all trains were far behind schedule. Luckily, I had a ticket for another train, and the conductors allowed me to board at 9:40 am, minutes after I arrived. No seat was available, but that was acceptable. It was supposed to be only two hours from Changde to Changsha, Hunan, where I would change to a high-speed train.

Ten minutes later, however, the train came to a halt.

A man surnamed Qin kindly gave me his folding stool, and he sat on his luggage. Curling up in the 1.5-square-meter area by the door, we talked.

Even though this was public transportation, smokers hung around continuously. It was suffocating. At first I was annoyed by passengers walking by and bumping me as they used the door, but I soon changed my mind: Their passing was a relief. The fresh air they brought with them dissipated the smoke.

Tiring of the long conversation, I stood up repeatedly to stretch and walk around for awhile, then returned to sit again. I had no other means to kill time as my phone was almost out of power.

An announcement on the train's public address system said workers were repairing damage caused by the storm and asked passengers to wait patiently. But this only made people more anxious.

Sighs and complaints could be heard everywhere. Somebody even shouted abuse. Emergency hammers had been collected and locked in the conductors' room.

This went beyond what anyone could bear. A voice on the public address system asked for a doctor to aid a woman who had fallen suddenly ill.

Vendors came along less frequently and they had less to sell. The bottled water and instant noodles were sold out. But a girl selling portable power supplies for mobile electronic devices couldn't have had better business. At 5 pm, Qin and I hurried to the dining car, only to find ourselves in a queue two cars long waiting for prepacked meals that one passenger aptly described as "odorless" and "colorless".

The train restarted at 8:30 pm, but moved for only 20 minutes. An elderly man with white hair fainted and a woman threw up. But there was still more to bear.

Sleep was the last resort for killing time, especially as midnight approached. After dozens of attempts in every sleeping posture you can imagine, I finally fell asleep on the stool. As the train repeatedly lurched ahead and then stopped again, I dozed and was jolted awake in a never-ending sequence of torment.

"We are arriving in Yiyang," the conductor shouted at around 6 am. Some passengers got off and I got a seat. I fell asleep immediately.

I was awakened again by two men discussing changing to a bus to Changsha. They did, and I joined them.

Could anyone have a worse experience? Yes. Qin arrived in Guangzhou at around 10 pm, 25 hours behind schedule.

Contact the writer at houliqiang@chinadaily.com.cn